Sermon Tone Analysis

The Greatest Wealth

This is one of my favourite pictures of old.

I am at the left hand side and my father Tony is sitting at the middle.

On the right hand size, is my aunt Suzy.

This was the only international trip I've got to do with my father, we were in London when this picture was taken, but we visited places like Syria, Lebanon, Germany and the UK.

Fast forwarding a few years.

This is me graduating as a second Lieutentant in the army.

This is me giving the speech of my class when I graduated in Economics

This is me when I got married to my wife.

This is me when I finish my degree in theology.

And this is me with my two little children.

All of these are happy memoirs of key chapters of my life, except for one fact: my father never got to live to see any of these.

He died at the age of 57.

I was there sitting on the ICU a few hours before he breathed his last.

My father died from complications arriving from a condition called pulmonary fibrosis, where the soft tissue of his lungs slowly dry out and become like scar tissue.

Like many other illnesses, no one knows exactly what causes pulmonary fibrosis, but what we do know is that certain lifestyle factors do increase your risks.

Sadly, my father never lived a healthy lifestyle.

I believe he saw health as a little bit of a product of chance.

One day he told me: Son, our heart is pre-programmed with a set number of beats.

Once we reach that number, that's it, we die.

There's nothing we can do to change that number.

Other times, he would tell me stories like: Uncle so and so from lebanon used to smoke a cigar every day of his life and he lived till the age of 103.

What kills us is the stress of modern life.

Sadly, my father was quite aligned with his own perspective.

A smoker through most of his life, he drank too much alcohol, he wasn't a fan of physical exercise, his diet was rich in sugar, fat and animal protein, he had trouble sleeping, he didn't spend much time outdoors, his day-to-day life was quite stressful and he didn't know how to cope with all that stress in any positive way.

My father was one of the most loving humans I have ever had the privilege to meet, but he left us way too soon.

I no longer had a father with whom I would share the greatest joys an disappointments of my life, I no longer had a father to consult when I needed wisdom.

I no longer had a father to pray for, nor a father to pray with.

This tragedy in my personal life led me to ask a big question.

How might I live longer and healthier than my father so that I can be there to my kids once they themselves become adults?

This question has been driving me for over a decade now and today I will share a little bit of my journey with health with you.

And so today I will share with you what 10 years of Biblical research have taught me.

So I typed in the word "health" in an online bible software to see what came out.

And this is what I found:

What is the greatest wealth that a man can have?

Family?

Time?

I believe Health is the number one.

I may have family and time, but without Health I won’t be able to enjoy neither.

In fact, if I lose health completely, I will lose my life, and nothing else will matter.

These are my children.

Catarina (4) and Antoine (1).

I love them deeply, even more than my own existence.

And when I am thinking of their wellbeing, I ask myself the following question: What kind of wealth do I want to leave to my children?

What can I do today to positively impact their future and give them best chance for happiness and fulfilment?

My goal is for them to know tthat hey are loved, and to live their purpose, by making good use of what they have, and grow even more.

I want the very best for them!

You may not have children and perhaps I don’t make sense to you, but God is your maker and even if no nobody else cared, He cares.

It is God’s plan that you prosper in Health and today we will go through some evidence of how God has equipped us to prosper in Health.

Here is a letter from the beloved disciple John:

But what is Health?

As defined by the World Health Organization, health is “a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.”

While this definition of health is quite thorough and relatively inclusive of the various dimensions of health, it fails to fully reflect the Biblical concept of health.

Essentially God’s concept of health for you is not only that, and even science now is catching up with God’s message and slowly bringing this subject to surface.

I. Biblical Concept of Health

A. Health vs. Shalom

If you run a Bible search on the word "health", you will collect very few results.

In fact, the Revised Standard Version uses it only 6 times.

But if Health is such an important asset, and God wants the best for our prosperity and wellbeing, then why God’s Word for us don’t mention much of health?

Well…This is not due to the fact the Biblical authors didn't think it wasn't important, it is because the ancient view of health is quite different from our modern understanding, which led to the use of different words.

In general, our contemporary society thinks of health and its care as the domain of science, concentrated in the physical, described and treated as a function of nature.

Even when mental health is included, it is often thought of in terms of biochemical processes and solutions that are primarily physical in nature.

The Biblical approach, on the other hand, not only acknowledges the divine involvement beyond nature, but makes that involvement central.

Let me illustrate it for you.

For example, did you know that biblical Hebrew has names for more than 80 body parts, but it does not have a clear term for body?

This is because the Hebrew mind did not think of the human being as a purely physical object, nor could health be characterized primarily as a physical condition.

Because the Bible treats life as a matter of the whole person, undivided by categories such as physical vs. mental vs. spiritual, the Biblical word in Hebrew that communicates the idea of well-being is the term Shalom, which appears more than 350 times in the Bible.

While most people today translate that word to simply mean "peace", its use in the Bible is much broader.

Only 38 times it is used in the Bible for peace as contrasted to war.

The concept of Shalom includes the ideas of completeness, soundness, good welfare, prosperity, well-being, harmony between or among parties and harmony within oneself.

Through Shalom, the biblical idea of health, while including the physical state, extends through every aspect of human experience, including the physical, mental, spiritual, and social, whether individually, collectively, or nationally.

Let’s look at a few examples.

In Genesis 29, there's the first occurrence of the word shalom in the Bible, and the context is Jacob, the son of Isaac, inquiring about the well-being of his relative.

Genesis 29:5–6 (NASB95)

He said to them, “Do you know Laban the son of Nahor?”

And they said, “We know him.”

And he said to them, “Is it well [shalom] with him?”

And they said, “It is well [shalom], and here is Rachel his daughter coming with the sheep.”

Another example of this can be found in the following passage, about Jesus' development as a kid.

While in our culture it would suffice to say, "And he grew up as a healthy boy", this is how the bible described it:

Luke 2:52 (NASB95)

And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom [mental] and stature [physical], and in favour with God [spiritual] and men [social].

In Leviticus 26:6, we see another example of Shalom, this time being used in the sense of mental health, to express an untroubled state of mind that originates from acceptance with God, as we can read together in the screen:

Leviticus 26:6 (NASB95)

‘I shall also grant peace [shalom] in the land, so that you may lie down with no one making you tremble.

I shall also eliminate harmful beasts from the land, and no sword will pass through your land.

Not surprisingly , the ultimate shalom that represents a complete state of satisfaction and wellbeing can only be given by God.

To those who serve Him, He offers a covenant of shalom:

Numbers 25:12 (NASB95)

“Therefore say, ‘Behold, I give him My covenant of peace [shalom];

In the New Testament, shalom is expressed through the concept of Eirene, which often gets translated as peace, and it can be seen in multiple passages.

For example, in John 14:27 we read:

John 14:27 (NASB95)

“Peace [eirene / the gr.

equiv.

to shalom] I leave with you; My peace [shalom] I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.

Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.

and Romans 5:1

Romans 5:1 (NASB95)

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace [shalom] with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,